How Businesses Can Green Their Manufacturing Processes

Businesses aren’t always as efficient as they’d hope to be. In 2018 alone, 292.4 million tons of municipal solid waste, including paper, glass and plastic, entered the waste stream. With businesses looking to improve efficiency, meet regulatory standards and retain environmentally-minded customers, creating greener processes has become a prevailing practice across many industries. Green manufacturing processes revolve around 4 main categories: using renewable energy, using more energy efficient processes, pollution and waste reduction, natural resources conservation. With the many green manufacturing processes and efficiency strategies introduced into the industrial sector, improving efficiency has become the default in the world of business.

Renewable Energy and Business

With improved design and lowered cost, renewable energy options have now become viable options for many businesses to invest in to power their operations. Solar and wind energy are at the forefront of the renewable energy sector, though hydroelectric and biofuels are also viable and important options depending on the renewable energy options available. Many businesses also charge clients energy fees  relative to their energy expenditure, as well as buying into carbon credit programs to offset energy expenses relative to renewable energy investment.

Energy Efficient Processes

Energy efficiency can be applied in many different ways within the manufacturing sector. One of the largest consumers of energy within manufacturing is lighting necessary to make manufacturing plants, with 7% of energy expenditure being used for lighting. Improving energy efficiency with regard to lighting can be as easy as ensuring that all lights are being turned off when not in use, installing motion activated sensors to regulate light usage based on occupancy, as well as using energy efficient light bulbs that last longer and require less energy to produce light. Installing a goods lift in production facilities is another example of using equipment to improve energy efficiency. Goods lifts can rapidly increase productivity while reducing the amount of energy needed to move equipment, cargo and personnel around a facility, reducing all-around energy expenditure.

Pollution and Waste Reduction

Minimizing waste production is another important step in ensuring energy efficiency. Using materials with longer lifespans, materials with less environmental toxicity and reusing waste materials are all integral to improving energy efficiency of manufacturing processes. Some manufacturers are capable of providing their own heat and energy production from operating biomass boilers that use manufacturing waste, an innovative way to improve efficiency. Researchers are also developing ways to use carbon dioxide produced from manufacturing processes to produce fibers that can then be incorporated into fabrics, creating a much more efficient manufacturing loop.

Natural Resource Conservation

Manufacturers are investing in a variety of methods to improve resource and habitat conservation. Such examples include investing in sustainably sourced paper products that don’t require old-growth forest harvesting, providing facility-linked conservation areas, such as retainment wetlands, or investing in public or privately-funded conservation projects. Such efforts help to improve production processes as well as ensure a smaller footprint for manufacturers.

As the world shifts towards a newer, more efficient economic model, green manufacturing processes will play an integral part in ensuring maximum efficiency with minimal environmental impact.